I got Storm Front on cassette for Christmas 1989, which was odd for a couple of reasons. For one, it was exceedingly rare for me to get music as a gift. Yes, I'd been a known Billy Joel fan since 1983's An Innocent Man, but nobody bought me The Bridge (1986) or the live Kontsert (1987) album, so why this one? Did I ask for it? Did someone just make a wild guess? I don't remember.
And what did 12-year-old me make of songs about the economic plight of fishermen ("The Downeaster 'Alexa'"), manic depression ("I Go To Extremes"), Russian clowns and the ultimate futility of the Cold War ("Leningrad") and doomed relationships ("And So It Goes")? I didn't really pay attention to the lyrics, honestly. Mostly I connected to melodies and instrumental elements that caught my ear.
As an adult I'm struck by how uniformly strong Storm Front is. It's a vital piece of work, depicting its creator's life and concerns in vivid colors.
I realize that's not the majority opinion. Despite its great success (4x platinum; three top 40 hits, including Billy's third and final #1) most fans and critics place Storm Front in the lower tier of his work. AllMusic gave it two stars and called it "joyless" and "the beginning of the end." In some ways it did mark the end of an era for Joel, as he'd replaced his rhythm guitarist (Russell Javors) and bassist (Doug Stegmeyer), and broken with longtime producer Phil Ramone. All three had been with Joel since the mid-1970s and played big parts in his ascent to stardom. And of course there was the backlash against "We Didn't Start the Fire," driven by overzealous radio play and well-meaning social studies teachers.
The production is very late-'80s - synths and big drums - which I believe is the other factor in some of the dismissal of the album. For Storm Front was produced by Foreigner Guitarist Mick Jones.* Besides producing his own band's work, Jones had made a splash in 1986 by helming Van Halen's massively popular 5150. Though it's likely this album would have had bombastic production no matter who was producing, it's not a stretch to say that Jones likely pushed some of the songs - namely "That's Not Her Style," "We Didn't Start the Fire," and "I Go to Extremes" - to have a rockier edge than they would have otherwise.
But this isn't Billy Joel goes hard rock. For the most part it seems that Jones let Billy be Billy, so the album has all the moods and styles you'd typically expect. From the dirge of "The Downeaster 'Alexa'" to the horn-driven white soul of "Storm Front" and "When In Rome" to the contemplative simplicity of "Leningrad" and "And So It Goes"."
Lyrically, the album is a swings back and forth between looking inward and looking outward, leaning heavier on the former. There are seven songs clearly drawn from Billy's personal life, and six of those are seemingly about his relationship with then-wife Christie Brinkley. They all point to different degrees of turmoil. Though Billy and Christie wouldn't divorce for five more years, the warning signs are here already.
"That's Not Her Style" is a direct refutation of tabloid rumors about her lavish and hard-partying lifestyle. Interestingly, the song is framed entirely negatively, saying those things aren't her style, but never defining what actually is, and as such the song comes off as defensive and possessive. Clearly being half of a celebrity couple was not easy for Billy. "When In Rome" finds him trying to put a brave and happy face on being in the public eye, but the line "I don't mind masquerading with those other fools" betrays itself.
Tellingly, the word "fool" recurs twice more. In "Shameless" Billy sings, "You make a total fool of me," adding a bit of ambiguity to what is otherwise the record's only moment of unabashed devotion.** "I Go to Extremes" - an apology to Brinkley for his wild mood swings - opens with the line, "Call me a joker / Call me a fool." All is clearly not well, especially considering that "I Go to Extremes" is not an answer but a question: "Darling, I don't know why I go to extremes," he confesses over and over.
Just to underscore all of that, we have "State of Grace," bemoaning a constant sense of disconnection and miscommunication between the two of them, and the metaphorical title track uses the metaphor of an oncoming storm to ruminate on the fact that he knows he's gonna fuck things up. The final verse lays it all out:
"I'm still restless for the open water
Though she gives me everything I need
She asked me to stay, but I'd done my navigation
I drove her away, but I should have known
To stay tied up at home"
The final personal song on the record is the stunning closer "And So It Goes," and it only concerns Christie Brinkley in a roundabout way. It's actually about model Elle Macpherson, whom Billy was dating and living with when he took up with Brinkley. The lyrics are somewhat oblique, but it almost reads to me as though Billy is taking Macpherson's perspective to try to understand what he put her through.
Even the three songs that look outward still have personal elements to them. In "The Downeaster 'Alexa'" Billy names his narrator's boat after his and Brinkley's daughter, Alexa Ray. "We Didn't Start the Fire" is obviously a very wide-ranging song, but just like Sam Beckett could only quantum leap within his own lifetime, Billy starts his narrative from the year of his birth, 1949. And finally, there's "Leningrad," which interweaves the story of a Russian clown named Viktor Razinov with Billy's own story to form a rumination on our shared humanity.
Though it may have been literally the beginning of the end of Bill Joel's recording career, given that it's his penultimate album, Storm Front is not in any way a sign of flagging talent. In fact, I'd label it his final masterpiece.
I guess even 12-year-old me knew that.
*Billy returned the favor by singing on "Just Wanna Hold," the opening track on Mick's solo album, which was also released in 1989.
**This song of course became a #1 country hit for Garth Brooks in 1991.
Comments